Denman Fink, Attributed to. Miami Skyline, circa 1925. Likely painted for the Florida Pavilion at the Chicago Century of Progress, 1933-34.
Denman Fink made important contributions to art development in Florida. An illustrator and muralist, Fink was head of the art department at the University of Miami for twenty-five years. After art education in Pittsburgh and Boston, Fink worked as an illustrator for Scribner’s and Harper’s Magazines. He did work for Collier’s Weekly, Pictorial Review, American Magazine, Delineator, Red Cross and other magazines. During World War I Fink painted one of twenty-four large canvases used for the Fourth Liberty Loan Drive at the New York Public Library on 5th Avenue in New York City. He painted another large canvas for the American Library Association, commissioned for the Allied War Work Campaign, that was exhibited in larger cities of the country, the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, D.C., and the Library of Congress.
Fink and his family first came to Miami in February 1920 to spend the winter with his mother Medie Fink, and his sister Mrs. Althea Merrick. He had just completed an important poster for the Inter-Church World movement campaign and a series of paintings on Florida subjects for a volume of Florida verse by his nephew George E. Merrick. Fink moved permanently to Miami in 1924, joining George Merrick in his development of Coral Gables. With Phineas Paist, the architect of Coral Gables, he helped design plans for the city, its entrances, fountains, plazas’ and the Venetian Pool.
In 1938 Fink, after intercession by several congressmen, won a federal competition to paint a large mural for the court house in downtown Miami. The mural, Law Guides Florida Progress, finished in 1941, depicts the development of Florida from the days of the Seminoles to the evolution of law and justice. Many local personalities served as models including Fink himself and Phineas Paist. His work was exhibited at the Art Institute of Chicago, the City Museum of St. Louis, the Pan-American Exposition, San Francisco, and Washington Art Galleries on Miami Beach. The Miami Herald November 23, 1941 describes Fink’s exhibit of sketches at the Blue Dome Fellowship Galleries, in Coral Gables, “Quite a handful of modern murals have been sketched upon our local walls by Denman Fink, for 15 years engaged in the business here in Miami, for 12 years engaged in teaching the hopeful young of the University of Miami… ‘The Citrus Harvest’ made for the Lake Wales post office…a patio panel done for the residence of Peter Wright on Miami Beach, showing medieval figures amidst a plentitude of fruits, horns and lances. For the St. Francis Hospital Mr. Fink painted the gentle saint of the people comforting the halt and the blind…The theme of Columbus’ landing appears in an over-mantle scene for the residence of William Griffin of Miami Beach…a triple panel for the Cadillac Hotel showroom…you may also see in this show the original sketch made for the huge mural now adorning a wall in the federal court room in Miami’s Federal Building.”
Fink also painted murals for the Eastern Airlines office and the Miami Beach Surf Club. He died in Miami in 1956. An editorial in the Miami Herald, June 8, 1956 noted his passing, “Coral Gables is Fink’s Monument. Denman Fink has folded up his easel and laid aside his design board for the last time… the community has lost one of its outstanding citizens.”
Born: August 29, 1880, Springdale, Pennsylvania.
Died: June 6, 1956, Miami, Florida.
Education: Boston Museum School with Phillip Hale and Frank Benson; Art Students League, New York City with George Bridgeman and Joseph De Camp; Pittsburgh School of Design; Pupil of Tarbell and Walker A. Clark.
Membership: National Society of Mural Painters; Salmagundi Club, New York City; Florida Society of Arts and Sciences; Blue Dome Fellowship; Florida Federation of Art.
Exhibits: Coral Gables Elementary School, Art Exhibit, April 10, 1928; Miami Woman’s Club, 1st Annual Artists’ Salon, February 1929; Miami Woman’s Club, 2nd Annual Artists’ Salon, February 1930; Florida Federation of Art, 3rd Annual, Miami, March 1930, member of jury; Art Institute of Miami, First Annual Exhibit, Biltmore Hotel, Coral Gables, 1933, Kate, Tropical Sea Garden, Fishing, Manley Brower, Tropical Sky, Great Blue Smokies, Bobbie, Saint Francis, (loaned by St. Francis Hospital, Miami Beach); Miami Beach Public Library and Art Center, February 1939, Mural for St. Francis Hospital; WPA sponsored mural, Harvest Time-Lake Wales, for the Lake Wales Post Office, 1942; Housekeepers’ Club annual, Coconut Grove, February 1942; Miami Beach Public Library, February 1942, Portrait-James Dunn (The owner of Gulfstream Park in Hallandale.), Ingnatz Garden; Florida Federation of Art Annual, Miami Beach, December 7, 1945, member jury of awards; Miami Woman’s Club Annual, February 1948, portrait, Miami sculptor Willie Jane Frost; Junior League of Miami, 1st Art Exhibit, March 1948; Lowe Art Gallery, University of Miami, Faculty Exhibit, May 1952, portraits; University of Miami, Faculty Exhibit, May 1953, Professor Emeritus and judge; National Academy of Design; Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art; Art Institute of Chicago; American Water Color Society, New York City; City Museum, St. Louis; Special showing war canvas, Congressional Library, Corcoran Gallery, Washington, D.C.; Pan American Exposition, San Francisco; Illustrator, Mace’s History of the United States, The Barrier, The Post Girl, Lost Borders; Illustrator, Harpers, Scribner’s, Century, Saturday Evening Post.
